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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/23650531">Under Your Spell</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/Laily/pseuds/Laily'>Laily</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Doctor Strange (2016), Marvel Cinematic Universe, Spider-Man (Tom Holland Movies), Thor (Movies)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Action, Avenger Loki (Marvel), BAMF Loki (Marvel), BAMF Stephen Strange, BAMF Thor (Marvel), Developing Relationship, Drama, Enemies to Friends to Lovers, Fluff, Hurt Stephen Strange, Hurt/Comfort, Jotunn Loki (Marvel), Loki Whump, M/M, Mutual Pining, Not Avengers: Endgame (Movie) Compliant, Protective Loki (Marvel), Protective Stephen Strange, Protective Thor (Marvel), Romance, Shapeshifter Loki (Marvel), Sick Loki (Marvel), Sick Stephen Strange, Slow Burn</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-04-14</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-04-14</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-02 22:15:50</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>5,899</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/23650531</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/Laily/pseuds/Laily</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Loki has been under Stephen's skin for the longest time. Something's gotta give. </p><p>AKA The three times Loki saved Stephen's life, and the one time Stephen returned the favor.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Loki &amp; Thor (Marvel), Loki/Stephen Strange, Stephen Strange &amp; Thor</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>26</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>372</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Under Your Spell</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>One would think having not one, but two bad-ass sorcerers working together would be a good thing. The world, at least, should be a much safer place. Chaotic, but safer.</p><p>“Controlled chaos,” as the Mighty Thor would say in defense of his brother.</p><p>The controlled aspect of it had yet to be seen.</p><p>But desperate times called for desperate measures, for sometimes even the great Nick Fury had to swallow his pride (not to mention the urge to swallow his only functioning eyeball) and call upon the great Loki of Asgard for aid.</p><p>Happy to oblige but loath to show it, Loki of Asgard would appear as a reluctant consultant (rather than the reformed-supervillain, anti-hero for hire that he was) and paid handsomely he would be, every time. Because he was just that good.</p><p>And that was something Doctor Stephen Strange simply would not stand for.</p><p>Far be it from him to deny anybody or anybeing the chance to redeem oneself, but why must it be Loki of Asgard the Avengers always turned to for help?</p><p>Sure, there was the one time Stephen had refused to come to Nick Fury’s aid, when the whole debacle with Mysterio and the Elemental monsters threatened to obliterate London off the face of the Earth.</p><p>But he really was unavailable at the time! The Hong Kong Sanctum needed major repairs and he suspected one (or all) of the contractors had been short-changing him – which turned out to be a red herring; as luck would have it, one of his own apprentices was caught red-handed stealing, but yes, to cut a long story short…</p><p>Nick Fury could really, really hold a grudge.</p><p>It did not matter that London was technically never in any real danger in the first place (except, perhaps, from the legion of destructive drones under the sole control of a power-crazy lunatic)</p><p>It was nepotism. Stephen was sure of it. Thor had been singing Loki’s praises from every rooftop all the way up to the heavens, and Thor’s default setting (which was loud, and louder) could have only worked in Loki’s favour.</p><p>Loki’s dazzling acts of magic (never mind that it was magic from another <em>Realm</em>) even caused the occasional buzz among of the members of his own Order. It took all Stephen had not to issue a cease and desist order to his underlings, for that would just be the pettiest thing to do, wouldn’t it.</p><p>Doctor Stephen Strange was not a petty person. And he certainly was not one to succumb easily to as petty an emotion as jealousy.</p><p>So Stephen stewed in silence. He would watch the news footage in the privacy of his study where no one could see him.</p><p>Too flashy, he would think to himself.</p><p>“And what’s with the helmet?” he criticised out loud. “And that hideous cape?”</p><p>The tap the Cloak of Levitation gave him on the shoulder seemed to say ‘Ahem, ahem’, and Stephen never said another word about Loki’s choice of attire ever again. It was a secret Stephen would probably take to his grave, for if Loki had not been wearing what he was wearing, they would have had to look for a new Sorcerer Supreme sooner than he would have liked.</p><p>It was a battle that demanded magic and physical strength both; Doctor Victor von Doom’s Doombots may be resistant to mental, emotional, and illusion attacks, traditionally, but the upgraded versions they happened to be fighting that day weren’t resistant to meting out illusion attacks of their own.</p><p>It was the first time Stephen and Loki found themselves fighting on the same side. The unspoken pact between them was obvious for everyone to see, and the Avengers were more than happy to spread the fight so the two rivals would never get to meet on the field of battle, so to speak.</p><p>A Doombot fired a laser beam of some sort in a display of generic armoury Stephen had gotten used to deflecting, and Stephen casually lifted a generic shield of his own, not knowing he was setting himself up for a commoner’s death.</p><p>He realised a heartbeat too late that it was actually a bullet, the fastest military cartridge in the market (with a muzzle velocity Tony Stark had calculated later to be more than 3000 feet per second!) aimed for his heart.</p><p>Even Loki’s seidr-fortified vambrace imploded under the force of its impact as Loki intercepted the bullet just in the nick of time. </p><p>That was when Stephen learnt humanoid-looking aliens bled just the same, and their blood looked just as red as it ran down Loki’s shattered wrist.</p><p>But as they say…waste not want not. From rage or from pain, the spell Loki cast to the wind splintered the very ground they were standing on as Loki’s blood magic came to life; every drop of his ancient blood turned into a deadly projectile that found its way to pierce and eviscerate every Doombot in the vicinity with lethal precision.</p><p>Showered with nocuous debris and exotic particles, Loki was the picture of cool as he dusted the ash off his armour with his one remaining functional hand.</p><p>Loki just gave Stephen a <em>look</em> with those piercing eyes of his, and the next second, he was gone, leaving Stephen to stand alone in the dust. Literally.</p><p>He patted his heart. It was still beating.</p><p>“Thanks,” he managed to mumble. There he said it. Was he thanking The Vishanti? Or Loki?</p><p>It hardly mattered since the latter was no longer around to hear it.</p><p>Stephen picked something off the ground. It was a piece of gold-plated metal of some kind. He fingered the stain on it and his hand came away sticky with blood.</p><p>Loki would want this back, Stephen thought. It may be broken, but he would bet an arm and a leg that the vambrace was forged back in the days long-gone before the fall of Asgard. Loki would want it back.</p><p>That night, when Stephen joined The Avengers for a celebratory dinner, Loki was mysteriously not present. Stephen did not know if he should feel disappointed or relieved.</p><p>“Loki doesn’t like celebrations,” Thor said as he poured himself a drink. “He used to be full of life, that Brother of mine.”</p><p>“Oh?” Stephen found that hard to believe.</p><p>“Oh yes. He was a theatre aficionado, with a good eye for the arts.” A thoughtful look fell across Thor’s handsome face. “You should have seen the statue he commissioned of himself.”</p><p>A sad, longing chuckle. “He’s…changed now. Not as flamboyant as he once was.”</p><p>Stephen lifted a sceptical eyebrow, yet a part of him believed Thor. He had expected Loki to be all in his face tonight, gloating over the fact that the Great Sorcerer Supreme now owed him one,</p><p>
  <em>You owe him your life, you moron</em>
</p><p>But if the God of Mischief preferred the company of a book to a night of reveling, if Loki was not around to claim credit for what he had done…then it must have just been a fluke. Loki just happened to be at the right place at the right time.</p><p>To Stephen’s dismay, the fluke became a repeat occurrence, and not a moment too soon after, too.</p><p>When Masters of the Mystic Arts began dying from a mysterious affliction that had them delirious from sepsis or screaming in excruciating agony for days until they drew their last breath, Stephen knew he had a very, very serious problem at hand. A problem neither his magic nor impeccable clinical acumen could have ever prepared him for, for he soon fell victim to the very illness that had killed so many of his people.</p><p>When the first stomach cramps hit him a day after a communal dinner at Kamar-Taj, he had put them down to a bad cockle or something, but soon after came the bleeding, a profuse and persistent bleeding that would soak through his bedding as quickly as they could change it.</p><p>Wong’s healing prowess and Christine’s state-of-the-art machines could find no magically or medically remedial cause for the fire burning him from the inside out. Stephen had never felt pain like the agony slashing his insides like claws, trawling his guts and ripping them into shreds.</p><p>Stephen lost all sense of reality after that, waking up days later in an unfamiliar room, a chamber whiter than any surgical or medical suites he had ever seen.</p><p>Where was he? Stark Medical?</p><p>“You are in New Asgard,” A kind-looking woman in a Healer’s robes explained. She seemed to be the only one who could make out his words, groggy and slurred from the wonderful drugs that must be running through his veins for he did not feel a <em>thing</em>. He looked down at his abdomen. It was still there and just the way it had always been, intact and unbreached.</p><p>So…no exploratory surgery then. <em>What the hell happened?</em></p><p>
  <em>Wait a minute.</em>
</p><p>“Did you say New Asgard?” he asked dimly.</p><p>The Healer nodded. “His Highness Prince Loki recognised your symptoms. He was the one who brought you here.”</p><p>
  <em>“Loki?”</em>
</p><p>“Yes. You have just missed him.” The Healer held a device of some sort to his forehead, and hummed approvingly. “No more temperature. Three days you have been unconscious, today is the first time Prince Loki has not left you any of his bespoke healing stones. You must be on your way to recovery.”</p><p>This time, Stephen tracked Loki down to the Prince’s own secret alcove in New Asgard’s sprawling library.</p><p>“Your Healers will not tell me anything.” Great. Now he sounded like he was whingeing.</p><p>If he was ruffled by the rude interruption, Loki did not show it. He only lifted his head slowly from the tome he was reading and looked Stephen up and down.</p><p>An exquisite bergère chair in the very shade of emerald Stephen had always imagined Loki’s eyes to be this up close appeared out of nowhere, and with a subtle tilt of his head, Loki gestured for Stephen to sit.</p><p>Reluctantly, Stephen obliged. He was still feeling a bit woozy, what with the blood loss and all the gallivanting he had done just as soon as he felt strong enough to leave his sickbed. True to his Name, the God of Mischief was one elusive bastard.</p><p>Loki plucked something from a secret compartment deep inside the high neckline of his leather tunic, and wordlessly placed the object on the marble-top side table between them.</p><p>It was a small glass jar that contained something too fine for Stephen’s eyes to see without further scrutiny.</p><p><em>May I?</em> He asked silently with his eyes.</p><p>Loki nodded his head ‘go on’. “It was what I found inside you.”</p><p>Very similar to the bristle on a hard brush, it was the length of a toothpick, but its half-opaque, organic surface texture was unlike anything Stephen had ever seen before.</p><p>“What is it?” he heard himself ask, bracing himself for the ridicule he was undoubtedly going to get; Loki had little patience with human ignorance, or so he heard.</p><p>If someone had asked him then which surprised him more, Loki’s answer or the gentleness in the way Loki answered him, Stephen would be hard-pressed to say.</p><p>“It is a baleen,” Loki said simply. “From a whale.”</p><p>Stephen gaped. “How the hell did that get inside me?”</p><p>Loki studied Stephen’s stunned face with unreadable eyes. “It was hidden in your food.”</p><p>Stephen’s mouth dropped even further. “I think I would know if someone had put a big-ass toothpick in my food.”</p><p>“You should have known,” Loki shrugged, and went back to his book. “Could have saved your friends.”</p><p>Stephen’s face burned. He held his tongue before it could escape his conscious control. It was the only way he was going to get answers.</p><p>“How?” he asked tightly.</p><p>The quiet storm in Loki’s eyes took a few heartbeats longer to assuage.</p><p>“Loki,” Stephen gritted his teeth. “<em>Please</em>.”</p><p>With a sigh, Loki closed the book he had only been pretending to read. “The way the ancient Inuits did it, they would coil a sharpened baleen tightly in frozen blubber and slip it into a piece of meat before feeding it to the wolves.”</p><p>Loki’s voice grew quiet. “Once it reached your bowels, the blubber would have thawed and sprung the baleen loose. If it was only one, it would have punctured a hole and you die from blood poisoning.”</p><p>Loki tipped his sharp chin at the jar.</p><p>“If you accidentally ingested a handful of these?” There it was, the tiniest hint of a smirk. “I’d imagine they would make the prettiest ribbons out of your intestines.”</p><p>
  <em>Who? Why?</em>
</p><p>As if Loki could read his mind, he twisted his wrist and suddenly in his hand, was a tiny scroll of paper.</p><p>Stephen plucked it out of Loki’s long fingers and unrolled the piece of papyrus.</p><p>
  <em>Papyrus? Who the hell used papyrus anymore?</em>
</p><p>A name written in an elegant script floated above the parchment before it magically evanesced out of existence. Stephen fought the sudden chill threatening to climb up his spine.</p><p>“I read the baleen and that is the name that came to me,” Loki said quietly. “Do with it what you will.”</p><p>“You read it?” Stephen looked up sharply. “As in psychometry?”</p><p>“Is that what you youngsters are calling it nowadays?” Loki sniffed delicately before turning once more to his book to resume his reading, for real this time. The audience was over. “I assume you know this person who wanted all of you dead?”</p><p>Stephen nodded, but he could not leave without asking one final question</p><p>
  <em>How did you know?</em>
</p><p>
  <em>Why did you save me?</em>
</p><p>
  <em>Who <strong>are</strong> you?</em>
</p><p>Seconds stretched into minutes as Stephen debated with himself; so many questions and he could not decide which to ask. Loki saved him the trouble and answered one for him, albeit vaguely.</p><p>“I had a wolf once,” Loki said, his voice mellow, his eyes shadowed.</p><p>Stephen found it suddenly difficult to breathe as the air grew palpably heavy around them. He could only choke out one word. “Why?”</p><p>The shadows darkened.</p><p>“It was what Mother would have done.”</p><p>And in the blink of an eye, Loki teleported out of sight, and Stephen found himself standing in an empty library.</p><p>Nimble, Stephen remembered thinking of Loki. Fast.</p><p>One might be tempted to run after him one day.</p><p>He and Wong found the perpetrator readily enough, decomposing in his secret hideout high up in the mountains. Stolen manuscripts were found scattered around his badly mangled body.</p><p>It was the last remaining Zealot that had eluded them ever since Kaecilius departed for the Dark Dimension.</p><p>“He was attempting to reopen the Dark Dimension,” Wong realised.</p><p>“To retrieve Kaecilius?” Stephen ventured a guess, based on the markings on the ground; the Zealot had been in the middle of a summoning ritual when he was…interrupted by whatever, or whoever, had killed him.</p><p>“And instate him as Sorcerer Supreme.”</p><p>It was conjecture, a speculation at best.</p><p>Sorcerers stopped dying then. Things returned to their routine, normal states of being.</p><p>Stephen found no reason to worry, not at all. Things had been pretty quiet on the physical and metaphysical fronts. No monsters or mythical beasts, no Avenger-level threats…nothing to see, nothing to kill.</p><p>Wong was perfectly good company, if silent camaraderie happened to be your thing. There was only so much companionable silence you could be around before the boredom set in and you scrolled through your phone for somebody to call…only to find that you had no one you could talk to. Socially.</p><p>The bristling on the back of his neck alerted him to a sudden presence at his door. A godly presence.</p><p>“Thor Odinson.”</p><p>“What do you know of truth spells?” Thor asked abruptly, forgoing all salutation required by normal social convention.</p><p>“Depends. Are we talking Wiccan? Pagan?”</p><p>“I don’t know,” Thor growled. “Only that Loki has been hit with one.”</p><p>“Okay…” Stephen said slowly. “It is not usually fatal, Thor. Best to let it run its course and he should be back to normal before you know it.”</p><p>“He threatened to cut off his tongue if one of us even so much as looked at him.”</p><p>Before Stephen realised what he was doing, he was pulling on his gloves, and the Cloak of Levitation snugly around his shoulders. “Where is he now?”</p><p>“In my bedchamber back at the Avengers Tower.”</p><p>At Stephen’s disbelieving look, Thor felt pressured to explain. “He would have run if there was any strength left in him, I think.”</p><p>“What do you mean?” Stephen had never heard of a Truth Spell so potent it could sap the physical strength out of someone.</p><p>“You’ll understand when you see him,” Thor said as the portal closed behind him. He led Stephen down the corridor.</p><p>“From what I could gather, the curse would last till the turn of the next moon. Harmless, as you said, but if you’re Loki…” Thor hesitated only for a second, before he pushed the door all the way open.</p><p>“A figure from our past did this to him.” Thor spat out her name, “Amora.”</p><p>“Why didn’t you come get me sooner?” Stephen sounded more angry than he intended.</p><p>“He only fell unconscious this morning,” Thor replied tersely, sounding just as angry. At himself more than anyone else, Stephen suspected. “I came to you as soon as he did.”</p><p>“When was the last time he ate or drank anything?” Stephen tried to keep the horror out of his voice.</p><p>“Since the day Amora made herself known to us.” Thor’s voice cracked with emotions Stephen could not name. “All these centuries we thought her dead. It has been two weeks since Loki had the muzzle on.”</p><p>“Two weeks?” Stephen could not believe his ears, but what he was seeing with his eyes was a scene out of a nightmare. Beneath the flimsy blanket, Loki was mere skin and bones. Occasionally, a shudder of a breath would rattle his chest and thick, dark blood mixed with saliva would trickle down his jaw, seeping from underneath the contraption locked around his mouth.</p><p>“He put the muzzle on himself the moment he realised he could not undo the curse on his own.”</p><p>“He should have come to me,” Stephen muttered again.</p><p>“You are naught but a stranger to him, Doctor.”</p><p>“Then <em>you</em> should have!” Stephen said angrily.</p><p>“Do you think I haven’t tried?” Thor asked quietly. “The mention of your name upset him most of all.”</p><p>“What?” Stephen’s face felt numb. “Why?”</p><p>“Perhaps it was you he wanted to hide the truth from most of all.”</p><p>Stephen refused to entertain the notion behind Thor’s words, too angered by everyone’s indifference. If it could not be Thor, it should have been somebody. Anybody who lived in this damn Tower. Stark, Banner, Rogers…where were they when this was all going on under their very noses?</p><p>It took Stephen longer than it should to locate a vein he could stick a needle in, as dehydrated as Loki was.</p><p>Stephen sat by Loki’s side longer than he should, replacing bag after bag of IV fluids and administering injection after injection of vitamins and trace elements that starvation had depleted from Loki’s body.</p><p>He was by Loki’s side even when Loki finally opened his eyes days later. Upon finding the muzzle gone, Loki pulled his dagger out, but in his panic, it fell uselessly to the floor before Loki could either stab himself or Stephen, who then decided to play it safe anyway by putting the dagger away in one of his pocket dimensions.</p><p>“Easy, Loki, easy,” Stephen murmured. “Look.”</p><p>He held a small bottle between his thumb and forefinger. Golden wisps of a gaseous compound swirled around in it as if it were sentient and looking for a way out.</p><p>Loki’s hand flew to his throat.</p><p>“My voice?” he mouthed, his face a mixed expression of abject horror and utter relief.</p><p>“I pulled an Ursula on you.” At the blank look in Loki’s eyes, Stephen decided filling in the context could wait. “I’ll tell you the story once you’re better.”</p><p>As Stephen tried to feed Loki the first spoonful of broth, Loki pursed his mouth shut in defiance. He found out soon enough that even with his voice gone, the wretched curse could still work his lips, so he reluctantly took in the first mouthful, and the next, and the next.</p><p>Stephen pretended he could not read the words Loki could not help mouthing in between each spoonful.</p><p>The next day when Stephen returned to the Avengers Tower, Loki was gone.</p><p>“He’s gone back to Asgard to recuperate,” Thor said, his demeanour much calmer than the last time Stephen had seen him. There was a softness in Thor’s eyes too, and Stephen had a feeling he had once again won his way into Thor’s good books.</p><p>Stephen pawed his tunic, frantic. “But I’ve got his – ”</p><p>“Keep it,” Thor interrupted. “At the new moon, let it out. It will find its way home, he says.”</p><p>Stephen could only nod, dumbfounded and more than a little dejected.</p><p>Thor grabbed Stephen’s shoulder with one of his massive hands. “You have my thanks, Wizard.”</p><p>So on the night of the new moon, as promised, Stephen opened the highest window in The Sanctum and uncapped the bottle.</p><p>The golden tendrils of foreign energy hovered in the air. It glowed beautifully against the starless night sky.</p><p><em>“Thank you.”</em> Loki’s voice resounded in his head, as clear as day.</p><p>Stephen stood at the window for what seemed like hours long after Loki’s voice had left him to find its way home. It felt too much like saying goodbye to a very good friend.</p><p>It was two months later that Stephen laid eyes on Loki again.</p><p>He received an alert out of the blue, an all-hands-on-deck sort of call he could not ignore, even if Nick Fury was on the other end of the line. <em>Especially</em> if Nick Fury was on the other end of the line.</p><p>“This looks strangely like the Fire Elemental monster that attacked London a few years ago,” someone said through the Comm-Link. “Didn’t it turn out to be nothing but a holographic projection?”</p><p>“Why do they always have to go for Manhattan?” This time it sounded like Tony Stark. “They could have picked another city, <em>any</em> city. Somewhere with not so many power lines – ”</p><p>“Never look a gift horse in the mouth, Stark.” Fury’s dry voice cracked through, as sharp as a whip. “You have no idea how much I saved on jet fuel just last year alone.”</p><p>Stephen swept his eyes across the battlefield, a smouldering stretch of burning apartment blocks and crumbling structures, and as if answering a silent call, his eyes landed on Loki, who was standing tall beside his Brother on top of the one building left standing.</p><p>“I should go see if I could penetrate its matrix again, disable the drones from the inside – ”</p><p>“No way, kid.”</p><p>“But Mr Stark – ”</p><p>“You should listen to your elders, Spiderling.” A cool voice interrupted what was arguably but undeniably a pointless argument.</p><p>“Mr Loki?”</p><p>“Brother…” Thor was about to utter a word of caution, but Loki was no longer standing next to him, in his place now a handsome peregrine falcon.</p><p>True to its reputation as the fastest animal on Earth, Loki dived straight into the heart of the Elemental.</p><p>Stephen waited with bated breath until Loki emerged again, first to settle on Thor’s shoulder; it was a tense few seconds before Thor finally managed to paw the last of the fires from Loki’s soot-blackened coat of feathers. The Comm-Link was tomb silent until Loki rematerialized, looking as cool as a cucumber and not a hair out of place.</p><p>“It’s real,” Loki spoke to all, but his eyes were on Stephen. “No illusions this time, I’m afraid.”</p><p>Stephen took that as a signal, and twisted his hands in the direction of the Hudson River. A second later, a giant wall of water surged to a height equivalent to that of the fifty-storey building Loki was standing on.</p><p>The Elemental disappeared under the body of water with a deafening roar that abruptly died as a geyser of steam shot into the air high above the billowing clouds of vapor.</p><p>“Is that it?” Tony Stark’s voice chirped through the link. “Tell me that’s it.”</p><p>A loud, resounding crack shattered the air, and those on the ground looked down at their feet in growing alarm; crevices split the asphalt and buildings alike as the centre of the Earth seemed to rise to the surface. Magma spilt onto the streets, and from the flowing lava, rose the Elemental once more, bigger and much, much hotter.</p><p>“Surtur…” Loki breathed out, the first glimmer of fear breaking his cool façade.</p><p>“No,” Thor growled. “Not Surtur.”</p><p>“Sur-who?” Spiderman squeaked as he struggled to keep a building standing long enough for its occupants to evacuate, his webs stretched taut under the strain.</p><p>Thor’s eyes burned bright and blue as storm clouds gathered over their heads. Before anyone could seek cover, a savage thunderstorm began to pour, but it did little good; just as soon as a part of its body evaporated under the heavy rain, The Elemental regenerated it again.</p><p>“It’s never going to end!” Captain Steve Rogers yelled, raising his shield just in time to stop a falling piece of burning wood plank from hitting a fleeing civilian. “He’s tapping straight into the core of the earth!”</p><p>“Loki,” Thor called out quietly.</p><p>Loki froze at the regretful tone of Thor’s voice. “No, Thor. You can’t.”</p><p>“We have to try,” Thor said in Asgardian.</p><p>“You can’t ask that of me,” Loki hissed.</p><p>“Care to share with the rest of the class, Your Majesties?” Stark said sassily.</p><p>
  <em>Majesty. </em>
</p><p>Loki stared into his Brother’s eyes, and deep into his soul; he then knew what Thor was seeing had been what he was thinking all along.</p><p>
  <em>The Rightful King of Jotunheim. </em>
</p><p>Thor’s kind eyes shone a bright, icy blue, as blue as the ancient relic thrumming deep within Loki’s core.</p><p>Loki closed his eyes. When he opened them again, Stephen was a few feet away.</p><p>“What are you planning to do, Loki?” the Sorcerer Supreme demanded. “Tell me.”</p><p>Loki threw Stephen one last look.</p><p>Helpless. Resigned.</p><p>Longing.</p><p>“Watch and learn, Second-Rate,” Loki whispered, and leaped into the air, landing gracefully on the spire of a church.</p><p>Thor followed his Brother with unreadable eyes. “We need to separate it from the Core, cut it off its power supply.”</p><p>“How do you propose we do that?” Tony stalled in mid-flight as he watched The Elemental rage through the city.</p><p>“Stark, Strange. Lift the beast up when I say,” Thor commanded softly.</p><p>“Uh, sorry to break it to ya, Point Break, but we mortals can’t exactly <em>lift</em> something that is made entirely of fire?”</p><p>“Aye, you can’t lift fire, true,” Thor nodded. “But you can lift <em>ice</em>.”</p><p>“What are you talking abou – <em>Holy Shit</em>.”</p><p>Stephen whipped his head around to where Tony was looking, and heard a collective gasp of surprise on the Comm-Link.</p><p>Where Loki once stood was a tall, slender figure with skin the palest shade of blue, his slim face delicately ridged with intricate markings Stephen could only guess the meaning of, in his hands a glowing, blue chest.</p><p>“The Casket of Ancient Winters,” Thor said proudly. As if on cue, as soon as he finished saying it, a glacial, frigid blast of raw power erupted from the box in Loki’s hands.</p><p>“Everybody get back!” Stephen heard Thor yell, as biting, freezing cold struck Stephen to his very core. His teeth chattering violently against each other, gasping in breath after icy breath, he could only watch through eyes near-blind from the whiteout as ice began to encase The Elemental in thick, impenetrable layers.</p><p>“Ready?” Thor hollered as he began swinging Stormbreaker over his head. “Now!”</p><p>Tony swooped up from below and began to push The Elemental up into the air, “Doctor, a little help?”</p><p>Stephen summoned the wind and worked the gale from below, pushing the monster, now completely frozen through, upward.</p><p>A bolt of lightning flashed in the sky, and for one heart-stopping second, everything turned white.</p><p>Stephen’s vision cleared just in time to see Thor looming over him, the Stormbreaker high above his head as the God of Thunder prepared to strike.</p><p>“Stark!” Stephen lunged and grabbed the Iron Man by the arm and pulled him in through a portal just in the nick of time; upon contact with Thor’s mighty axe, The Elemental exploded into a million shards of ice – they burst into a kaleidoscope of colours as they caught the light of the returning sun.</p><p>Stephen uttered a spell and every single shard of ice disintegrated into nothing but water, directing it to put out all remaining fires below.</p><p>“That,” someone gushed, “ – was so <em>cool</em>, Mr Loki!”</p><p>“He’s gone, Little Spider,” Thor said in a voice heavy with regret.</p><p>Stephen whirled around and searched frantically for any sign of the red-eyed, blue-skinned Sorcerer Prince.</p><p>“What?” Spiderman leaped onto the very spire Loki was standing on only a minute ago. “Where did he go?”</p><p>Thor looked up at the sky, clear and crystal blue once more. “One can only guess.”</p><p>_________________________________________</p><p>This time, Loki really did not want to be found. Stephen no longer cared what the others thought; the more people knew he was looking for the Prince of Asgard, the better.</p><p>“No, His Highness has not been home in a while, Doctor.” He had even put Imogen, the Healer he had made friends with, on his speed dial, and made her promise to call him should Loki show up in Asgard.</p><p>Thor, the one person closer to Loki than anyone, was of no help at all.</p><p>“He will come around, Stephen,” Thor said, always with the sympathetic eyes. “In time.”</p><p>The few meagre books he had on spells to summon Norse Gods and the like were likely balderdash, none of them written earlier than the nineteenth century.</p><p>“I have never seen you like this before,” Wong commented randomly one bleak, boring night.</p><p>“Seen me like what?” Stephen glumly tossed a crumpled ball of paper into the wastepaper basket in the far corner of the room. Waste not want not, he retrieved the ball by magic and proceeded to throw it in again –</p><p>
  <em>Waste not want not, Doctor.</em>
</p><p>It hit him like a lightning bolt, and he bolted out of his chair, reappearing a heartbeat later in his bedroom, pitch-dark and definitely empty.</p><p>Stephen had always thought his room was too large for one person; it took him all of ten seconds to reach his dresser by the window. Granted he should have switched on the light rather than fumble around in the dark, but that was another five seconds in another direction.</p><p>Stephen rummaged through his drawer and instantly found what he was looking for. He held the gleaming object close to the window.</p><p>The broken fragment of Loki’s vambrace glinted in the moonlight. Beautiful. Intricate.</p><p>Strong yet delicate, just like its owner.</p><p>Stephen breathed his magic into it, and hoped there was still some of Loki left on it to reach him, wherever he may be.</p><p>
  <em>Loki.</em>
</p><p>Stephen conjured an image of Loki in his Mind’s Eye, his Aesir and his Jotunn form both, and implored the universe to help him, help Loki</p><p>
  <em>Find me. </em>
</p><p>Stephen recalled the brilliance of Loki’s eyes, green and red alike. The sound of Loki’s voice.</p><p>
  <em>‘Thank you.’ </em>
</p><p>
  <em>Come to me.</em>
</p><p>An eternity passed, then another, and another.</p><p>And still Stephen kept waiting, and he kept calling.</p><p>Just as stars appeared in front of his eyes from the sheer mental effort,</p><p>“Honestly, Doctor...” a voice startled his reverie from behind. “You don’t give up easily, do you.”</p><p>Stephen’s breath caught in his throat; the window pane ceased to condensate underneath his hand, giving him a clear view of who was behind him. His fingers ghosted over the mirror image reflected in the glass of the one person he had been dying to see, but he dared not turn around for fear of shattering the illusion.</p><p>“I am here, as summoned.” There was a playful note in Loki’s voice. “Or did you dial a wrong number?”</p><p>Stephen turned around very, very slowly.</p><p>For all his jovial exterior, Loki could never hide his true feelings from showing in his eyes. Not from Stephen, at least. Loki had lost the ability to for a long time now.</p><p>“Why did you leave?” Stephen heard himself say. The first thing that came out of his mouth and of course, it sounded like whingeing. Again.</p><p>Loki did not answer.</p><p>Stephen’s tongue seemed to have developed a mind of its own. “I looked everywhere for you.”</p><p>“Oh, I’ve heard,” Loki whispered. Then he uttered but one word that sent a rush of dejavu coursing through Stephen’s body.</p><p>“Why?”</p><p>
  <em>Why were you looking for me?</em>
</p><p>
  <em>Why did you call me here, tonight?</em>
</p><p>
  <em>Why <strong>me</strong>?</em>
</p><p>And Stephen remembered the lines he had read from Loki’s lips all those nights ago. Lips he should have kissed right then and there, Truth Spell be damned.</p><p>“Because you’re all I can think about,” he repeated Loki’s confessions word for word, for Stephen too, meant them.</p><p>He meant them all, and he wanted to be the first to say them out loud.</p><p>“It is your face I see when I wake up in the morning.” Stephen took the first step toward him, outstretched hand at the ready to grab should Loki make a run for it, “And you’re the last thing I see when I go to sleep.”</p><p>Stephen finally closed the distance between them and wrapped his fingers around Loki’s wrist, the very one the bullet meant for Stephen’s heart had broken. “And when I awaken in the middle of the night from a dream…”</p><p>“I long for sleep once more, so it could return me..." Stephen rested his other hand against the side of Loki’s face, "To <em>you</em>.”</p><p>Loki stood frozen, his shell-shocked lips working as he mouthed something inaudible to the human ear, but Stephen heard it anyway.</p><p>There was a right time and the right place for everything, and Stephen knew deep down in his heart that this was it. This was the moment.</p><p>This was the moment, and he was ready.</p><p>“No, Loki.” Stephen shook his head and kissed Loki as gently as he could to spell the fears away. “You are <em>beautiful</em>.”</p><p>Loki’s lips tasted softer and sweeter than he imagined, now that he was kissing them for real. He felt them yield, but not as readily as Stephen had hoped.</p><p>Stephen kissed him harder, sending them both reeling backward into Stephen’s writing desk, and that was the very leverage Stephen needed.</p><p>He cupped Loki’s cheek, and traced his thumb lightly over the ridges he knew existed and had memorised by heart. “Whatever your form. You’re beautiful to me.”</p><p>Loki’s eyes welled. “You don’t give up easily, do you.”</p><p>“Well, I am a Scorpio so…” Stephen leaned down. “Nope.”</p><p>Loki laughed a soft, sweet laughter, as sweet as the lips Stephen sought to claim once more...</p><p>And suddenly nothing else mattered, for this time when Stephen kissed him, Loki kissed him back.</p><p>Not a damn thing.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Ursula is the villainous sea witch who stole Ariel's voice in Disney's The Little Mermaid. </p><p>Thank you for reading! Hope you enjoyed.</p></blockquote></div></div>
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